Reputation Marketing – Your Most Valuable Asset!

“…Your Reputation Precedes You!”

You may have heard of this phrase uttered in an initial business meeting or even in the movies. It means that you have a reputation and that they know all about you (as far as your reputation goes) before they ever meet you. However, nowadays and especially online, this phrase can go both ways, either a positive sentiment or a scathing blow.

Reputation is the most important factor that molds your business into successful longevity and is the only currency that truly does matter and here’s why.

People will work with you, buy from you, and invest in you based solely on your reputation. It is shaped by your character and your actions. Everything you do, regardless of your occupation or goals, directly contributes to the public’s perception of you and in this case, specifically about your business.

Marketing Game Changer #1

“80 Million Google Plus Pages Merged With Each Company’s Website And Reveals The Companies Reputation To Their Customers”

When you do a search for any company name and a city or street in Google, it reveals the company’s reputation.

As an example to the right, we typed in a company name plus their street and look what comes up. But look below after this, it’s their reputation score. They have a 2.5 out of 5 star rating which is a very poor. So anyone actually searching for them, maybe even just directions, is going to go and type in their name and the city to find some more information and they’re going to see what a bad reputation they have.

Marketing Game Changer #2

“Reviews Are A Major Part Of Online Marketing.”

Bad reviews show up in Google maps and your Google + listing, Pay Per Click, website rankings and organic rankings. They show up in almost every local directory like Yelp and City Search, Bing and Yahoo, in Yellow Pages... Reviews are a major factor in almost every type of online marketing and are the new “Social Proof” that the public now sees about your business all over the Internet.

Marketing Game Changer #3

“SEO… Social Media… Pay Per Click… Local Marketing...None Of It Is Effective Anymore….If You’re Not Monitoring And Get A Bad Review.”

… So really what we’ve seen over the last several years is a complete flip-flop in an online marketing strategy. Before we use to concentrate on Google maps or do Yelp or video marketing. Before, we would blog or we would do social media and then only afterwards would we work on getting some great reviews or work on getting some customers reviews. That’s completely the opposite of what today’s marketing is about.

Step one is, you need to create a five-star reputation first. Then you market your products and services online because who wants to get found when all they’re doing is wasting their money without first acquiring positive sentiment? The phone is not going ring because you don’t have that five-star reputation that companies or other businesses or customers are looking for today.

Marketing Game Changer #4

“Reviews Give You Pre-Qualified - Presold Leads Because Buyers Trust Reviews As Much As Family And Personal Recommendations”

So reviews can be incredibly bad for you if they’re indeed BAD. But they can be incredibly good for you if they’re really good.
Let’s look at this stat that came from Miles Anderson from Bright Local. 72% of buyers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations. Now, if I were to ask a hundred different companies, and let me just ask you. Would you create a marketing plan that, when people that don’t know you, don’t like you, don’t trust you, and arealways are worried about price?...or would you rather create a marketing plan with people that trust you, know you and like you and they’re all referrals?

So, of course you want to create a referral plan. Well, for the first time with our online marketing, we can be just as powerful as referral marketing. Approximately 75% of people trust reviews online just as much as personal recommendations. So we need those 5-Star reviews on your website. If you have five star review on your listings, that’s as good as someone’s mother saying you should go buy from this company. That’s as good as someone’s best friend saying, you know what, you should use this type of a service. That’s just good as a colleague at work saying look, if you need that, you should go to this business... they do a great job.